


if an angel falls in the forest and nobody's around to hear it, does it make a sound?

by saintmichael



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Adam is Michael, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen, God is OK, I wouldn't say he's great, he's trying okay
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-06
Updated: 2020-07-06
Packaged: 2021-03-04 23:47:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,719
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25114870
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/saintmichael/pseuds/saintmichael
Summary: Something went wrong when Michael was summoned to the fancy room, but not for reasons anyone would have suspected.AU where Michael fell and was reborn as Adam Milligan without anyone noticing.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 19





	if an angel falls in the forest and nobody's around to hear it, does it make a sound?

The door slammed in front of him, and Adam stared helplessly at it.

The white light pouring into the room was growing intense, but Adam’s eyes were adjusting to it pretty quickly. On the other hand, there was a low key buzzing in his ears that was filling him with dread. He turned around, not expecting to be able to see anything, but there were _lines_ in the light. Pulsing, moving lines that were somehow brighter than the whiteness. He was dizzied just by watching them.

The crushing heaviness descending on him didn’t help matters either. It felt like something was trying to shove his head into his feet and it sucked. He wanted to throw up. Well, he wanted to be _out of here_. The light that must have been Michael was coming through his eyeballs and ears and nose and mouth and it was bitter and toxic. “You can’t possess me!” he shouted, but he was choking on the stuff. “I don’t consent! No!” Just to be clear.

Michael didn’t seem to care, and the light kept bearing down on him. The pulsating lines were becoming bigger and clearer, and a few of them seemed to be forming a path, off into the distance. Desperate, he decided to follow it, managing to push his heavy feet off the floor and staggering forwards. The light shifted and warped around him as he moved, but the path lines remained steady, and the buzzing sound became louder and overwhelming.

It was difficult to think, and it was difficult to walk, as he felt more and more like his body itself was too heavy to move, rather than it being pushed down by something. He was nearly at a crawl as the light finally dispersed and he found himself in a colourless forest, with tall, foreboding trees looking down at him. The pulsating lines were still everywhere, and they ran throughout the ground, and up through every tree. He had time to pull in one big gulp of air before he started hurling.

After what seemed like hours and he had thrown up his entire guts onto the previously grey forest floor, he was desperately missing having the taste of Michael’s bitter grace on his tongue. He summoned the last of his strength and managed to stumble over to a tree, a far enough distance from the mess that he couldn’t smell it. He collapsed onto the trunk, holding on for dear life.

“Michael, please,” he croaked. “Mercy, please.” He didn’t understand why the archangel was doing this. Was this still part of the plan to bait Dean? Regardless, there was no response. “Yes?” he tried, fruitlessly, to silence.

He rested on the tree for a while. He didn’t want to sit down, in case he was never able to stand back up again. The heaviest feeling area was his back, like he was wearing a backpack with a ton of bricks in it. The weight was so intense he did twist his head a couple of times to make sure there wasn’t a car strapped to it or something, but there was nothing. His breathing felt like it had stabilised, but when he focused on it he realised he wasn’t not breathing at all. He shuddered and let the buzzing overtake his mind again.

The lines had stabilised too, glowing gently with a familiarity that eased Adam’s pain, just a touch. Many of them were still moving around, and he wondered if they were connected to trees as well, or something else entirely.

After a time – he wasn’t sure how long – he didn’t feel any better and reluctantly decided to find some kind of shelter where he could rest properly. He was in some kind of woods, right? Maybe there was a cabin or something nearby. He pushed himself off the tree trunk and took a step forward, and immediately fell over. _Shit. Really?_

He wanted to get back up, but he failed. Not with the weight on his back dragging him down. He screamed, a tired, dead scream that seemed to have no impact on the environment around him – except the buzzing, which stopped for a second before starting up again, more muted this time. But a singular buzzing sound had become more prominent; it was clearer and lower-pitched. Adam listened to it and got the idea in his head that it was _words_ , just they weren’t the right shape to go in his ears. He couldn’t shake that thought, despite how little sense it made. The other buzzing was the same, he realised: a cacophony of voices, speaking in ways that Adam couldn’t decipher.

“Hello?” he tried. “Where are you?” No response, it simply continued on like it didn’t hear him. He dizzily looked around for the source, but there was nothing living in this forest except for the trees. He exerted himself to get back up and hug back onto the tree. _I need a game plan_. Maybe screaming again would help; it had at least done _something_.

He looked at the glowing lines again. They had formed a path here, maybe he could use them to find somewhere else. They shifted just as he thought that, as if in response to the idea, and new golden lines lit up in the shape of another path. Not blinded by the light this time, he could see within the lines seemed to be another place entirely. _A portal?_ So, Michael hadn’t dropped him off in a forest, he had walked through a portal and got there himself. But Michael was making the portals, right? Or some other angel?

It looked nicer in the new place though. Colourful flowers and bushes neatly surrounded by marble retaining walls. Adam could sit on one of those, maybe. He couldn’t see any way to get to the portal, several meters away, without crawling, but it wasn’t like there was anyone watching anyway, so he shrugged and got on his knees. The grey dirt was far softer than he imagined, so as he slowly made his way along, it was only the tugging on his back by the unknown weight that was causing him any discomfort.

The marble was strangely soft, too, and as soon as he was on it the world around him became alive. He could smell the plants on the breeze and hear the sounds of insects and small animals nearby. The buzzing sounds also became far louder. Instinctively blocking his ear with one of his hands, he used the other to slowly drag himself over to a ledge. He didn’t quite have the strength to pull himself onto it, but he was able to get into a sitting position, leaning against it.

Even with the obnoxious buzzing, he was exhausted enough to fall into some kind of half-sleep, the lines and garden around him gently melting into a soft blur of colours. The deep buzzing occasionally rose up out of the chorus while he rested, speaking to him for some time before dying back down. Adam felt a little bad that he didn’t know how to respond; although he couldn’t really make sense of the voices, he got the feeling that that one was worried.

Eventually, he had to get up. He couldn’t stay here forever. It was a little bit easier to move, now, and he hoisted himself up on the ledge. He observed the lines, here: they criss-crossed through the air and the ground, running through every plant and animal in the garden.

As he focused, he could begin to dimly see a line, much larger than the others, that seemed to run right through him. It was so thick that it was more like a golden rope than a line of light. Adam waved a hand through it experimentally and it was weird, like something was there but he couldn’t quite reach it. He tried to deliberately focus on it and touch it again and it solidified in mid air enough for him to grab. He held onto it and wondered where it led. It just seemed to go off in the distance forever. He waggled it, trying to see if it was tense or loose, but it was solid as a pipe. A painful shock ran up his arms and he jumped back in dismay.

 _Ok, it doesn’t like being shaken. Fine._ He gingerly reached out to it again, keeping his grip as light as possible while still using the rope to support his body. He didn’t get zapped again, so he slowly manuevered himself along it. His aching body kept complaining, but he told it to shush. Maybe there was a pond somewhere up ahead he could soak his weary muscles in. Or a bench. Something.

But the lines were shifting again – except for the big golden one, that held steady – and he was once again heading somewhere else entirely. The beautiful garden around him was melting into the scraggly, unkempt backyard of a modest-looking house. It was a bit of a downgrade from the pristine marble paths and the huge plants bursting with vibrant colours, but Adam continued on. A house meant people. Well, maybe not. This place looked kinda rundown; he wouldn’t be surprised if it was abandoned. But maybe there was an abandoned bed in there.

The golden rope led straight through the house. Into a window where, to Adam’s shock, there was a man standing there, eerily staring straight at him. He was frowning. He was pretty scraggly looking himself, in a dirty bathrobe and underwear, and an ungroomed little beard on his face. But as Adam focused on him, still climbing forward tiredly on the robe, he realised that not just the rope, but many of the lines in the area were connecting to the man. And more and more lines became visible to him, all converging on this one person, clustering the air, blocking him out of Adam’s vision. Adam stopped, suddenly afraid.

The man moved, disappearing from his place behind the window and appearing right in front of Adam. The lines faded temporarily from Adam’s sight but quickly re-emerged, the concentration of them in this one place blinding him with their potency. He held an arm up to his face, trying to block them from view, but it was futile. His arm was wrenched down to his side by a strange force and he fell down from the impact.

“Michael,” the man spoke in a light, nasally voice. “I believe I instructed you not to track me down. No matter what. Was I unclear…?”

He sounded mad. Adam wished he could see his face, but more and more lines keep appearing somehow. It was impossible to see him underneath all of them.

“Help. Please,” Adam said desperately. He didn’t know what the guy meant, so he disregarded it. “I’m being tortured by some asshole angel. I need somewhere to hide. Please.”

“An angel.” The man sounded a little incredulous. Well, Adam couldn’t blame him. “Which one?”

“Zachariah or – or – I think he’s dead. So it’s probably Michael. Maybe he’s mad cause his trap didn’t work. Please, you gotta help me.” The man was silent, but after a few moments, gentle hands were pulling Adam up to a standing position.

“What’s your name?” he asked, sounding strange.

“Uh, it’s Adam. Adam Milligan.” The lines of light were so painful on his eyes. Adam squeezed his eyelids shut, but somehow could still see them clear as day.

“Adam. Okay.” He felt a hand reach behind and rub his back, but – his back seemed further back than it should be. He made a sound of confusion. “I don’t know what’s going on here – I lost track of you for a bit. But don’t worry. I don’t think Michael is torturing anyone right now.”

“You don’t?” Adam didn’t know how he would know that. “You know him? Are you an angel, too?” Oh no.

“No, of course not.” The man paused again. “Why won’t you look at me?” A finger swept over his eyelids coaxingly.

“The lines. They’re too much. Sorry,” said Adam.

“The lines?”

Adam knew it sounded stupid. “Uh, they connect to you. And they’re really bright, and there’s a lot of them. I don’t know what they are.”

“Ah,” he said. “Well, perhaps Daddy can fix that.”

“Daddy?” Adam asked, but a thumb was already pressing on his forehead and it felt like cool water was being poured into his brain. The lines quickly vanished from his vision and when he opened his eyes, he couldn’t see any either. He glanced down at the big gold one he had been using as a walking aid and stumbled when he realised that was gone too, but the scraggly man quickly grabbed his arms and smiled down at him. Wait, no. Smiled up at him. The guy was a good deal shorter than him. But it felt like he was being smiled down at, for some reason. “Uhh, oh. You did fix it,” he said stupidly.

“There we go,” the man said calmly. “I’m still not sure what’s going on here, but we’ll work it out.” He rubbed Adam’s not-back again. “Did you need help putting these away, as well?”

“Putting what away?”

“Your wings, Michael. They’re completely extended. Can’t you feel them?”

Adam turned and looked at the guy cupping air in his hand behind Adam’s back. “What? I don’t have wings.”

“Okay. Daddy will handle it,” he said soothingly. He did _something_ and Adam felt his back constricting strangely, then releasing its tension all at once. The huge heaviness he had been feeling evaporated as well.

“Uhh, thanks,” he said, bewildered. He stood up a little straighter and breathed in a sigh of relief. He was ready for his bath now.

“A bath? Well, I think we’ll have a chat first, won’t we?” said the man, and he started pulling Adam towards the window. Adam definitely hadn’t said that out loud, but his situation seemed to be improving somewhat so he obediently followed him. He disappeared into the wall next to the window and pulled Adam through it as well. There was zero resistance, like it was simply air. Adam was led into the living room, and he wished he was still blind, because the place was filthy. He tried to keep that thought quiet though, in case he offended his host.

“I’m not offended, Michael,” he said. “I know this place isn’t to your taste.” Adam flushed and ducked his head down shyly. “Sit on the couch, okay? Let’s try and figure out what’s happened here.” Adam hesitatingly sat on the, not entirely threadbare couch, and leaned back gratefully into its supporting embrace.

“So, Michael tried to possess Adam, but something went wrong and now he thinks he’s his vessel. Is that right?” the guy mused thoughtfully.

“Michael possessed me? No,” Adam said, frightened. “I said No.”

“Did you?” he said. “And yet,” he tapped Adam’s arm and a burning sensation ran through it as light glowed from the inside. “He’s inside you.”

Adam was on the verge of crying. “No, no, no,” was all he could think to say. “He tortured me. Make him stop.”

“Michael’s not torturing you,” the guy said vehemently. “He’s not the type. Okay?”

“He’s, he’s,” Adam stood up, the dizziness quickly returning to his head. “He’s mad because I’m not Dean. So he sent me to the forest and made me throw up. He’s evil.”

He was guided back down to sit. “Michael, you’re just confused, okay? You flew to your little hidey hole in Purgatory and your vessel got sick from it.”

He pulled his knees up to his chest and his hands to his ears. “No, no. You’re wrong. Michael’s punishing me for being the wrong vessel. He hates me.”

“Okay,” he said, and Adam was getting real sick of that word. “Michael, we’re going to fix whatever’s happened here. I just need you to be a good boy and calm down.”

Adam scowled and drew his body in even tighter, before realisation struck him. “You – you’re Michael,” he said, eyes wide. “You’re trying to trick me!”

He crouched in front of Adam, looking a little sad. “No, I’m your Daddy,” he said. “Don’t you recognise me, Michael?”

“Stop – stop,” Adam said, exasperated. “I don’t want this anymore. Please leave me alone.”

He sighed and stroked Adam’s hair. “You came to me. Remember?” He searched Adam’s eyes. “You’re sick. That’s fine. I’ll put you to sleep and try to separate your grace from Adam’s soul and hopefully that sorts you out, alright? I think you must have gone a little too far when you possessed him.” He was patted patronisingly on the head. “Sleep, puppy.”

Adam couldn’t resist. He slept.

**

Adam woke. Eyes open, instantly alert. The worried face of the scraggly man was peering down at him.

“What time is it?” he asked. The man smiled a little.

“It’s eleven thirty.” Adam’s eyes widened. In the _morning_? He tried to get up, but he was pushed back down.

“What’s wrong, Michael?” the man asked.

“I slept in,” he said, upset. “I don’t like sleeping in.”

“That’s okay,” the scraggly man said. “You’re sick. Also, please stop calling me a scraggly man. It’s Daddy, alright?”

Adam made a face, and ‘Daddy’ sighed. “Am I talking to Adam or Michael?”

“Adam,” he said bluntly.

“I see. How old are you, Adam?”

“I’m 19,” Adam answered easily, but then he frowned. That didn’t seem quite right. “…Billion.”

“You’re 19 billion?” Daddy pressed.

It did seem a little odd, but Adam knew he was 19, and he also knew he was billions of years old. “Um, yeah,” he replied sheepishly.

“Are we sure that Adam isn’t 19, and then Michael isn’t 13 billion?” Daddy suggested. “If you’re 19 billion, that makes you even older than me.”

“Uh,” Adam said. “I’m 19 billion.” That seemed like the safest answer. Daddy sighed again.

“Well, it looks like some wires are still crossed. I thought I separated you two, but work is still needed, it seems.”

“I’m not a robot,” Adam said irritably. What was this guy even on about? This somehow earned him another pat on the head. “I’m not a dog, either,” he snapped.

“Perhaps not,” Daddy said, smiling, “But Michael is my little pup.” He stared off into the distance. “Why is Michael not acting as the dominant personality? This is all very strange.”

Adam was torn between equal urges to run away from this crazy asshole and to sink further into the amazingly soft sheets wrapped around him. He settled by turning over to face the mattress.

“Adam,” Daddy warned, but Adam ignored him. Michael had tortured him and now this guy was talking like Adam had done something to Michael instead? He could fuck right off with that. He melted into the bed beneath him. He didn’t feel even a little bit sore; it was a miracle.

“Okay,” he said. “You need to go back to sleep if I have to work on you more, anyway. Goodnight, Adam.” A hand pressed on his neck, and Adam was asleep again.

**

Adam woke up. Eyes wide open, instantly alert. The room was pleasantly warm, and the scent of flowers gently wafted through the air. He wondered what time it was.

He sat up and had a look around. The room was large and mostly beige coloured, with light streaming in from huge windows on three of the walls. They looked out to a dense forest starting a few meters from the building. There were tons of potted plants placed artfully around the room, and everything was quite neat and pleasing to the eye. There was a bedside table with nothing but a piece of paper with a large note scrawled on it. Adam wished it had a clock.

The note said, “MICHAEL. Do Not leave your bed if you wake up early. Daddy will be home soon. Xoxo.” Adam read it a few times, perplexed, then left it on the side table.

He had to go find a clock. He wandered out of the room, and was surprised to find that the rest of the place was rundown and gloomy looking. He found the living area, and realised he was still in the same place as before.

There was a laptop on the coffee table. He opened it up and checked the time in the corner. 8:48, it was a little later than he preferred but at least he was up now. The date was more worrying. 6/5/10? He… didn’t the stuff with Zachariah happen yesterday? But he was sure it had been April when he was resurrected. He had been kind of out if it in the grey forest and the marble garden, maybe – oh no. He had to eat. Three weeks without eating? How was he not dead? Instantly in a panic, he rushed to the kitchen and started digging through the cupboards for stuff to eat. They were unfortunately sparse – there were some snacks here and there: half eaten candy bars, packets of chips, a bag of gummy worms – but Adam couldn’t find anything substantial. He just needed calories _fast_ so he couldn’t afford to be picky. He found a bag of mixed nuts and threw them down his throat, then grabbed the stuff that didn’t look too sweet and began shovelling them down as well.

“Michael?” a voice said, and Adam looked up to see his Mom standing there, frowning at him. She looked a lot more like a nervous homeless man than she used to, but Adam was pretty sure it was Mom. He grinned back at her.

“Mom, hey –” he glanced down at the junk food on the counter in front of him. “I haven’t eaten in three weeks,” he explained, embarrassed.

She said, “Michael, did you read my note? I asked you to stay in your room.”

Oh, Mom wrote that note? “Sorry, Mom.” She huffed a little and looked even more unhappy.

“Mom?” She shook her head. “Just stay in your room, ok? I haven’t fixed you yet. I have to deal with the Apocalypse as well, remember?”

Adam didn’t know what she was talking about. “Sorry.” He collected the rest of the snacks and started slinking back off to the bedroom.

“Michael, wait,” she snapped. He turned to her, worried. She pointed at the open laptop on the coffee table. “Why were you looking at my computer?”

“Huh?” Adam said. “I needed to check the time. There’s no clocks in this place.”

“Time.” Her expression softened slightly. “You didn’t look at anything else?”

To be honest, Adam hadn’t even thought to. There had been an article or something open but he hadn’t given it a second glance. “Uh, no, Mom.”

“Fine, fine,” she waved a hand. “Did I not put a clock in your room?”

Adam shook his head. She put a hand on his shoulder and began steering him to the room. “Just stay in bed and rest for now, alright? My good little boy.”

“Yeah,” Adam said uncertainly. “Um, is there anything to eat in this place? I couldn’t find much in the cupboards…”

They entered the room and she directed him to the bed, which he sat on. She sighed and tapped the wall facing the bed, where a big clock appeared.

“Happy?” she asked.

“Yeah. Mom, um…”

“Food,” she rubbed her forehead in exasperation. “Michael, you don’t need to eat food. Can’t you tell just by looking at yourself that your vessel is perfectly healthy?”

Adam glanced down at himself. Sure, he looked healthy. “But Mom, I haven’t eaten in three weeks. So I’m starving to death even if I look fine. Otherwise it doesn’t make any sense.”

“Michael,” she said tightly, then raised her eyes to the heavens and back down at him. “Fine. What do you want?”

Oh. A choice? He’d had a lot of burgers and sandwiches lately, he should probably have something different. “Spaghetti?” he asked hopefully.

She snapped her fingers and a plate of spaghetti appeared in her hand. “Eat this, then try to go back to sleep,” she instructed bluntly. “Stay in bed. I’m very busy at the moment. I’ll be back to sort you out later.”

“Okay Mom,” Adam said. She must have been having a lot of long night shifts at the hospital in a row. She wasn’t usually so short otherwise. She turned to leave but paused and looked at him.

“Michael, what’s my name?”

“Kate Milligan,” he said, bewildered. She pinched her nose and turned back away.

“Later, later,” she muttered, probably to herself, and left.

Adam ate the spaghetti. It was good, but it didn’t taste the same as how she normally made it. Probably cause she made it with magic. There was something about that thought that rung as odd to him. He tried to think why, but it made his head hurt.

He put the plate on the bedside table, and settled into bed. He examined the pyjamas he was wearing. Blue with little kittens on them. He hadn’t been wearing them for three weeks, had he? He sniffed himself. He smelled fine, but he’d prefer to have a shower to make sure he was clean. Mom said he had to stay in bed while she was out, though. She was clearly working hard; he didn’t want to upset her. He’d just ask about a shower when she got back.

He watched the ticking of the clock in front of the bed. The movement was nice and steady, and he was soon lulled back to sleep.

**

Michael woke up. Eyes wide open, immediately alert. Many of his senses had been paralysed and he couldn’t use them at all. He was in some kind of human vessel and their physical senses were operating normally. He was in a bedroom in an unknown location, heavily warded, difficult for him to analyse. He summoned a handgun from his weapon storage dimensions and crept out of the room, wary of his captors.

His numbed senses made him extremely cautious. Someone had done a very thorough job with it. – And who would have the knowledge to do so? Lucifer was the obvious choice, but he was in hell – No, Michael realised, it was 2010. His brother should be out of the cage by now. And Raphael, of course, had the knowledge and tools at his disposal. He had been acting rather shady lately, too.

He came upon a central living area. It was covered in dust and microbes, Michael noticed with disdain. There was also someone sitting down on the couch, scribbling on pieces of paper with some kind of frustration. Michael carefully avoided that area and looked for another escape route. Of course, he was too weak to avoid proper detection, and heard the sounds of his captor getting up from the couch and walking over to him. He found a room filled with laundry equipment and managed to squeeze in between the two big machines.

“Michael? Is everything okay, puppy?” his captor said, and Michael stared. It was his Father; even with his divine senses switched off, Michael could feel in his soul the familiar presence of the Lord of Light, the Father of All.

“Father,” he breathed. “You have returned to us.”

“Ah,” Father said, looking surprised. “I wouldn’t go that far. So it’s Michael Michael today.”

Michael did not understand, but he did not care. He was pleased.

“Did you return for the Apocalypse, Father?” he asked. “We will not let you down. Everything is going according to plan.” He was hoping that Father would cancel the Apocalypse, of course; but he knew Father was probably still too angry at Lucifer to do so.

Father said, “I _have_ cancelled it, Michael, as of two weeks ago. So no need to worry.” Michael was confused. He didn’t remember the Apocalypse being cancelled.

“You have been drifting in and out of consciousness for the last couple of months,” Father explained. “And your mind has been tied with that of your vessel. This is actually the first time you’ve been conscious as yourself. So naturally, you don’t remember.”

Michael made his way out of the tight space and kneeled in front of his Father. “Yes, Father. I apologise for my inaction. I am here to serve.”

“Did you understand anything I just said?”

“Yes Father. I have been asleep for a time and missed some events. Now I am conscious though, and ready to serve.”

Father crouched down in front of Michael. “You can tell Daddy if you don’t understand.”

Michael huffed. “Father, I’m doing my best.”

“Help me out then. Can you tell me what you did when you possessed your vessel? I’ve been struggling to untwine you two.”

His vessel? Michael looked down at it, then back up at Father. “Standard procedure, Father,” he said, puzzled. “I approached John when he was alone and requested the use of his body.” Michael was struck with worry. “He was under duress at the time, I admit. Am I to be punished?”

“No,” Father said patiently. “Michael, are you talking about John Winchester?”

“Yes, Father,” Michael answered.

“Okay,” said Father. He prodded Michael’s chest. “I’m talking about this vessel, though. You’re currently inside Adam Milligan. Do you remember possessing him?”

“No, Father,” said Michael. “I do not know an Adam Milligan. John is the only viable vessel of this generation.” He thought and realised if it was 2010, the newer generation would have matured. “I am wrong. I can currently possess Sam or Dean Winchester. There are no more vessels destined to be born in the bloodline.”

“Adam wasn’t destined to be born, but he _was_ born, and you possessed him two months ago. Try to remember, please.”

Michael did try to remember, but he rather thought Father had become confused. Michael possessed John, and then Father brought him here. When had he had time to possess another human in the meantime?

And two months ago? Two months ago, Michael was performing his regular duties in Heaven, surely. April 2010. He couldn’t remember anything in particular, though. His mind kept going blank when he tried to think about it. He looked dolefully up at Father. “I don’t remember possessing Adam, Father. My apologies.”

Father was disappointed. “Well, that’s okay, puppy.” He scrunched his face up in thought.

Michael suggested, “Father, if you release my supernatural abilities, I can simply separate from the vessel myself and evacuate to Heaven.” Michael wasn’t sure why Father was burdening himself with such a simple issue. Surely Father had more troubling problems to deal with.

“Your higher senses?” Father reached to Michael, but hesitated. “They were causing you pain earlier. Do you think you can manage them now?”

Michael wondered at that. “Yes, Father. I am a grown angel.” He didn’t wish to be rude, but it was perplexing that Father was treating him as some kind of fragile child. He could handle himself. He stared at Father earnestly.

Father sighed and tapped Michael on the head, and the film covering his senses was lifted slowly. Father was watching him cautiously, and Michael smiled at the sight of his Father, the centre of the universe, with all the bonds of Creation running through his core.

“Thank you, Father,” Michael said. “I am fine,” he added, to reassure him. He examined his grace, supposedly intertwined with this new vessel; he did not want to harm him while escaping. He found no human soul in the body, however. Was Father pranking him? He inspected Father’s worried expression with caution.

“What’s wrong?” said Father. Michael looked down again and tried shifting his grace around to find a soul buried within. He was afraid to accuse Father of shenanigans, but this was strange. There was only his grace and his own core.

“Father, I cannot detect the vessel’s soul,” Michael reluctantly reported. “I can attempt to evacuate the vessel regardless, if it pleases you.”

“No, no,” Father mutters, and reaches inside the vessel, tapping on Michael’s core. “The soul is right here, honey. Here.”

Michael examined it, but only his core was present. “Father, you are indicating my core,” he told his Father.

“No,” Father said, exasperated. Michael trembled and instinctively began searching for an escape route. He hadn’t intended to upset Father. Father grasped one of his arms and said firmly, “Michael, I’m not upset. We’re going to work this out, okay?”

Father escorted Michael back to the room he had woken up in. It was much more orderly than the rest of the establishment, Michael noticed, and was a newer construction than the rest of the house. Based on its age, and how long Father had said he’d been here, Father must have built it when he arrived. He frowned. Why was he always causing so much trouble for Father? This was why Father had left in the first place. His chest hurt, and his eyes began welling up with tears.

“Michael? Michael.” Father gently coaxed him onto the bed, and placed a cool cloth on his head. “Don’t burn up, okay? Good boy.”

Michael blinked through the tears and smiled weakly up at Father. “My apologies, Father. I am not sure why I am behaving so childishly.” He was doing his best to stop his halo from burning, but the embarrassment was making it flare up rather wildly.

“That’s okay, Michael, you’re sick. I just need you to remember for me what happened when you possessed Adam. April 18th 2010\. Good boy,” Father urged.

Michael finally managed to remember something. “There was a seraph calling himself Zachariah, Father. He was torturing me,” he recalled.

Father looked blank at this revelation. “He was torturing you? Are you sure?”

“Yes,” said Michael. “Because he didn’t want me. Or, or, yes, he wanted another person. My brother.” The memory had more details, he was certain; but they made no sense, so his mind was dismissing them as soon as it found them.

“No, Michael,” Father said, patting his forehead with the cloth. “That was happening to your vessel. Not you. You’ve gotten a little mixed up.”

That didn’t make any sense. It _did_ happen to Michael. He stared at Father, puzzled. Father smiled back encouragingly.

“Let’s go a little further back,” Father said eventually. “What’s the last thing you remember doing? As Michael. Not Adam,” he added.

“I possessed John, and then you brought me here and put me in this vessel,” Michael said.

“Okay,” Father said. “You possessed him in 1978 – and then what did you do after that? We have a 32-year gap here.”

1978? “Father, I mean when I took him in 1989. To destroy some cursed artifacts.” The 21-year blank spot in his memory was certainly an issue, however.

“Oh,” Father said slowly. “I wasn’t aware of that. 1989, huh? You must have slipped past my –“ He stopped suddenly, his eyes widening.

“No, no, no,” he muttered. “Not you, Michael. No, no, no. I won’t allow it.” Michael tilted his head in confusion at his Father. Father pushed Michael down on the bed and reached more roughly inside his grace, grabbing at his core. “What have you done?”

“I’m sorry, Father,” Michael said. “I know we were instructed to leave Earth alone until the apocalypse, but when there are items powerful enough to destroy an entire population, I thought – I thought perhaps I should just do a small intervention.”

“That’s not the issue,” Father said harshly, but he got off Michael, breathing heavily. “I will – fine. I need to do some investigating. How many artifacts did you destroy?”

“Sixteen,” Michael answered.

“Sixteen.” Father sighed. “Was anyone with you?”

“Yes, my deputy was assisting me. Zadkiel,” Michael clarified. “Should I summon her?”

“No,” Father snapped. Michael flinched and curled up on the bed. Father schooled his furious expression, with some difficulty, and said more calmly, “Just go back to sleep, puppy. Daddy will figure out what’s happened, okay?”

If Michael was feeling a little braver, he would have reminded Father that he didn’t need to sleep more than once in ten thousand years, and it would be more efficient to put him to work instead. As it was, however, he fearfully crawled underneath the blankets and peeked out at Father.

“Good night, Michael,” Father said, and forcefully pushed him into unconsciousness.

**

Adam woke up. Eyes wide open, instantly alert. He sat up, and noticed Daddy sitting in an armchair that had appeared next to the bed. He had some documents on his lap, and was reading them unhappily. He glanced up at Adam, and said with an eery serenity, “Good morning, Michael.”

“Good morning,” Adam said nervously. He looked at the clock. 7:30, hopefully in the morning. That was all right.

“Are you Adam right now?” Daddy asked.

“Uh, yeah?” Adam said. When wasn’t he Adam? Daddy pulled out one of the documents in his stack and tossed it onto the bed, on Adam’s lap. He glanced down at it. His birth certificate.

“You tricked me, Michael,” he said. “I thought I was dealing with two people that thought they were one. Now I find out it’s been the other way around this whole time? How cruel.” He was shaking, although Adam did wonder if it was just for theatrics.

“What?” Adam said dumbly.

“Michael Adam Milligan,” he said, like it was some grand denouement. “Does anyone actually call you Michael?”

That was a stupid question. “You do,” Adam pointed out. “And Mom calls me it when she’s mad.” He hesitated. Wait, wasn’t this his mother? But he wasn’t acting like Mom. Why would she be interrogating him about the name she gave him? And she didn’t usually look like a little man with a beard, either. He shook his head and continued, “It’s just a name I write on forms, dude. Mom didn’t mean to call me Michael. She was just hopped up on, I don’t know, giving birth hormones and wrote the wrong name by accident.” He pointed at where ‘Adam’ had been hastily scrawled next to ‘Michael’. “They let her fix it later, though.” He shrugged.

“Michael,” Daddy said, “The reason your human mother decided to call you Michael upon your birth is because you compelled her to.”

“Because I ‘compelled her to’? What does that even mean? I was a baby,” Adam said, taken aback.

“You were a baby whose name has been Michael for thirteen billion years,” Daddy said, smiling. It seemed hollow. “You unconsciously forced Kate Milligan to write Michael on your birth certificate.”

“Um,” Adam said. “No, I didn’t.” He glanced at the door in the corner of the room and wondered if he could make it out of there if he bolted.

“You can’t,” Daddy told him. Adam blinked. “Michael, I’m trying to help you, okay? You need to –“

“Wait, wait,” Adam interrupted, and Daddy glared at him. “Did you just read my thoughts?”

“Yes. Michael, don’t interrupt. Your grace didn’t properly reunite with your soul when it was summoned to you in that little room. You rejected it because you thought it was trying to bring you harm. So now you’re of two minds when you should be of one.” Daddy tapped Adam’s head. “I need you to accept your grace, okay? Then there’ll be no problem.”

Grace. That was the angel stuff, wasn’t it? It finally clicked in Adam’s head. “Wait, you think I’m the _archangel_ Michael? Are you fucking nuts? The psycho that used me as bait in his trap? And then tortured me?”

“You’re not a psycho, Michael,” said Daddy. “Nor did you use anyone as bait in a trap. You died 21 years ago and became reborn as a human, after all, so it’s simply not possible.”

“That doesn’t make any sense! Why was Zachariah trying to get Dean to say yes to a dead angel then?” Adam demanded.

“He was receiving orders from Raphael. Do you remember Raphael?” Adam shook his head. “Raphael wasn’t aware you were dead, he just thought you had wandered off somewhere. Summoning you to a neatly gift-wrapped true vessel was his idea of getting your attention without being rude. He has been punished, of course.”

Adam gaped. “But didn’t you just say Michael died 21 years ago? How could no one notice? Wasn’t he running the place?”

“ _You_ were running the place… Adam, I told you to accept that you are Michael,” Daddy scolded him. “21 years isn’t all that long to an angel. If you were missing for over a century, they might have started to worry. It looks like Zadkiel covered up your death pretty thoroughly before she fled, so no one else would have even known of it.”

“Who’s Zadkiel?” asked Adam. This lunatic was introducing way too many characters.

“The angel that was with you, Michael. I’m not a lunatic,” he added, frowning.

“She murdered me?”

“No. Michael, you were being a bad boy and carelessly handling some dangerous Earth items when that isn’t your job,” said Daddy, “And one of them got you back while you were disintegrating it.”

“Then why did she cover it up and run?”

“Because if she brought back the news that you had died while she was standing by, she would have been punished.” At Adam’s shocked look, he added, “It’s okay, though. I went and punished her myself when I found out about this.”

“What…” Adam trailed off. “You said you weren’t an angel,” he recalled unhappily.

“I’m not, Michael. I’m your Father. I thought you understood that. You’ve been calling me Daddy in your thoughts…”

“Yeah, because that’s the only name you gave me!” he snapped. “What do you mean you’re my father? I’m pretty sure John Winchester is a whole foot taller than you!”

He smiled thinly and said, “Your human father is a grain of sand in the universe created by my grace and light. I was your Father before you were human, Michael. If you stopped resisting your other half, as I instructed, you would have remembered that already.”

No, no, that didn’t make any sense. Adam didn’t want it to make sense. “You’re an archangel dad?” he suggested, instead.

“No. Michael, you know what I am.” He held Adam’s gaze for a moment, before Adam flopped back onto the bed and turned his face to the pillow.

“Nope, got no clue,” he said, his voice almost completely muffled. But this asshole could read minds, so who cared?

“Michael, stop being childish,” Daddy instructed. “We’re having a discussion. I don’t recall giving you permission to leave.”

Adam loudly wondered what kind of shitty father got mad at his kid for dying.

“I’m not mad, Michael, just disappointed. How could you be so careless with yourself when you had such an important job ahead of you?”

Adam vigorously thought that if this guy was _his_ father, he’d juggle with bombs too.

“Michael, don’t be so cruel. And it was an accident, honey. I know you didn’t do this on purpose. Just be more prudent, okay?”

Adam was _always_ prudent. And he bet Michael was, too. If the thing that nabbed him could kill an archangel, what would it have done to the unlucky human that chanced upon it?

“That doesn’t matter. Humans are built to die, and there are lots of them. There’s only one Michael.”

So this guy was a total psychopath, as well as being generally crazy. Adam pulled the blankets over his head to try to shut his voice out. _Humans are built to die_. He started sobbing. He missed Mom.

“No, Michael, that’s not what I meant.” He could feel Daddy trying to pull the blankets back, but he held on tight. “I just meant it wasn’t worth it, all right? It would have been better if you’d stayed in Heaven like you were supposed to.”

Why? Apparently no one noticed he was gone for over twenty years anyway!

“No, no. I’m sure people noticed. They just would have been too scared to go and look for you.”

What kind of cursed existence was that? Why would Adam even want to be Michael if it meant everyone was scared of him? If Daddy’s story was true – _it’s not, it’s not, I’m not him, I’m not him_ – then it sounded like everyone would have been better off he’d just fucking died all the way when he got zapped twenty years ago, rather than lurking in Adam’s soul this whole time.

“Don’t say that,” Daddy said. Adam’s grip on the blankets loosened against his will, and they were pulled off him. “And you’re not hiding in your own soul, or whatever you said. You are Michael, okay?” He wasn’t though.

His father – his – Michael’s father forced him to look up at him. “Just do your best to recall your old memories, Michael? Please,” he said. “It’s okay if it takes time. I just need you to try.”

Time. Adam tried to look at the clock, but Father was in the way. He moved just as Adam thought that. It was 7:41.

“Can you –“ He choked a little. This guy seemed a lot scarier now. “Can you stop reading my thoughts. I don’t like it.”

“Not while you’re sick,” Father said tersely. Then he relaxed a little and said, “I’m just trying to look after you. I’m sorry if I’ve scared you.”

Adam shook his head and didn’t respond.

“…I think I’ll be relocating you. I don’t plan to stay in this place any longer, so there’s no point keeping you here. Daddy will make you a much nicer house to stay in, okay? So you can be a little more comfortable while you recover your memories.”

“Can’t you just, um, take Michael’s memories out of me and use them to make a new Michael?” Adam asked. He really didn’t want to be some archangel that everyone hated.

“No, I can’t. Michael –” He pinched his brow and sighed. “Just rest up, okay? We don’t need to force this. Take as long as you need.”

The armchair was replaced with a tiny bookshelf with a small selection of books, and a laptop sitting on top of it. “Entertain yourself for a bit,” Father ordered. “I’ll come collect you when the new house is done.” He vanished, which made Adam’s heart jump a bit, and Adam was alone. He crept over to the door to see how trapped he was, and the handle wouldn’t even allow itself to be jiggled. He gave up and grabbed some pulp romance to flick through.

**

The new house was… extravagant. Big and golden, with sprawling spiral staircases and huge paintings on the walls. And plants stuffed everywhere they could fit, of course.

Adam wasn’t sure if it was supposed to be to Father’s taste, or Michael’s taste. It certainly wasn’t something _Adam_ would have opted for; it seemed way too large and wasteful. There were dozens of rooms and he used about four of them. The kitchen that was always freshly stocked was nice. Adam’s memory of it was fuzzy, but desperately stuffing six month old gummy worms into his mouth to sustain himself was definitely not an activity he wished to repeat. Although, he started to realise as he spent more weeks at the mansion, he didn’t really need to sustain himself with food at all. But it tasted good. And felt good. So, he happily kept it up.

He’d never been the greatest cook – oven ready meals were his specialty – but he had nothing but time now, so he learned. He found Youtube tutorials easier to learn from than recipe books. The recipes always seemed a little too vague for his liking.

The rest of his time was spent watching other videos, or reading, or playing games, or messing around outside. In-between his constant passing out, of course. It was so weird. He’d be feeling light as a feather one second, then his head was hot and heavy the next and he was falling onto the ground, succumbing to the darkness. His dreams were full of places and faces and words and stories he didn’t recognise, and then he would wake up, with a note from his Father on the bedside begging him to please be more careful.

Father was in-and-out, mostly out; it seemed the majority of his visits mostly occurred immediately after Adam’s sudden naptimes. That was fine by Adam, though; the more Michael’s memories returned to him, the more he definitely did not want to piss that guy off. And he pissed him off just by existing, it seemed.

Yes, fine, Adam was willing to admit he may have been an archangel in his past life. He super wished he wasn’t, though. It wasn’t like he killed Michael, but his Father was certainly content directing his rage for his best worker’s death at him. Well, he didn’t _say_ anything, exactly, but Adam could always sense him brimming with fury, and he knew it was at him.

As his archangel memories came back, things got a little easier. Adam remembered how to put up mental shields, so Father wasn’t reading his thoughts all the time. Father got a little snitty the first time Adam did this, but he also seemed pleased, Adam thought.

Adam was growing worried about his brothers, though. What felt like days passing to him were really months, and he was only able to observe this by checking the date every time he woke up. Apparently Father had arranged for Lucifer to go back to the Cage, and had simulated a Michael to go with him, so no one questioned his absence. The rest of the angels should be in Heaven, safe under Raphael’s guidance. But still, Adam worried about his brother. His deep voice, rising amongst the rest, calling out to him in concern. His heart ached.

“Father,” Adam said to him politely, on a rare occasion where Father had visited him while he was awake. “You said you punished Raphael.”

“Yes?” said Father.

“Did you, um, how severe was the punishment?” Adam asked, but even as he did he knew the answer. Father only had one severity for punishments, really.

“He’s dead, Michael,” Father said. He shook his head and swung his club at the ball. It again went nowhere near the hole. Adam wondered if Father realised that golf was easily won with a few simple calculations.

“Ah,” Adam said. He hoped Father would reconsider this. Raphael was a good angel. “And, um, Zadkiel?”

“Zadkiel?”

“My deputy, Father. She –”

“Left you for dead and covered it up so no one would know to come help you. She’s dead as well, Michael. I killed her myself.” They walked over to where Father’s ball had landed, for his next shot. Adam had gotten this hole six shots ago. He couldn’t fathom how Father kept missing.

Adam was also a little unhappy about Zadkiel. He wasn’t supposed to have survived the Empty Clock in any way, including reincarnation. She must have lost heart and meddled with his death at the last minute, allowing his grace to remain in his human father’s body for long enough to join with Mom’s womb and form a human soul. What if he had properly received his grace in that fancy room? He would have been forced to do the Apocalypse with Lucifer and the entire thing would have been for naught.

Still, Zadkiel was a good angel, too. If she had intervened, it would have been because of the kindness of her heart. She didn’t deserve death for this. Adam could resurrect her, once he had Michael’s powers back. That would probably be a matter of years, if not decades. Father was being extremely stingy with them. Adam didn’t remember it very well, but apparently when he had first approached him, he had been in a lot of pain from being unable to handle Michael’s grace. So even though he had a lot of his memories back, Father still insisted that his ‘human side’ couldn’t handle it.

Father missed _again_ , and Adam snapped. “Seriously? How hard is it to hit a fucking ball? You’re not even getting on the green!”

“Language,” Father said calmly. “Michael, I’m doing my best, honey. It’s not Daddy’s fault his son is a golf superstar.”

“I’m not –” Oh. He was being messed with. “Okay, you’re right. I’ll move up to the next hole and you try to catch up when you can.” He grabbed his own set of clubs and started walking off.

Father called out, “Michael, wait! Wait!” And he turned back expectantly. “I think I’ve got the hang of it now, sweetie. Just a couple more shots, I promise.”

Adam sighed and crossed his arms. “Fine. I’ll stick around for two more.”

Father smiled in triumph. “Wonderful. I’m sure I can manage it. You said, ah, hit to the green, I think?” He thoughtfully turned and examined it in the distance, before he elegantly whacked the ball with the club and it sailed through the air, landing within putting distance of the hole. Adam rolled his eyes. If Father wasn’t silently seething at him, he was treating him like an idiot little kid. Adam didn’t understand why. He hadn’t even spoken to Michael like this when he actually was a little kid, however many billion years ago that was.

“Who’s running Heaven then?” he asked, as they continued their game. “Seraphiel?”

“Who?” Father said blankly.

“The next highest-ranking angel after Raphael,” Adam explained, despairing a little bit.

“Ah. Well, no, but don’t worry about it, Michael. You don’t need to think about that sort of thing right now.” He finally sunk the stupid ball into the stupid hole. “Just focus on getting better, okay?”

That didn’t even make any sense. Didn’t Father want him to get better so he could go back to running Heaven for him? Not like he was gonna, but still. He asked his Father exactly that.

“No, that’s not currently a priority.” Father looked unhappy. “Just enjoy your vacation, please, Michael, I’m begging you. I have everything handled at the moment.”

“You’re running Heaven again?” Adam asked in surprise. It would never have occurred to him, even though it made perfect sense.

Father hesitated, and said, “Yes. I suppose I am.” It was a bit of a strange answer.

**

Adam woke up on a Monday. Monday had always been spaghetti night at home, so he cooked some for himself and ate it on the couch in front of the tv, curled up in a blanket and crying.

He missed his Mom. If Father would just let him use his wings he could visit her in Heaven, but instead he was stuck down here in this dimension in-between worlds, where there wasn’t another soul present.

Although… maybe he could draw up a portal and visit her that way. He would probably attract the attention of other angels, and Father would almost certainly kill him, but it’d be worth it, right?

Father suddenly appeared before him, as if he knew of Adam’s idle plans, and stared down at him. “Michael? What is it, pup? Did you remember something painful?” He was wearing a look of sympathy, and Adam wasn’t sure if it was sincere or not. He clutched his bowl of spaghetti close to him and shook his head. Father frowned deeply.

“Tell me what’s wrong. Daddy can help,” he promised. Adam didn’t really want to say, but he had the feeling Father would compel him to regardless. And there was a small chance his Father would actually help, rather than get angry Adam still cared about his “human mother” as Father kept calling her.

“Can I see Mom,” he choked out. “Please. It’s spaghetti night.”

“Hmm?” said Father, patting him gently on the head.

“I wanna see Mom. I, I, I.” Father was looking unnaturally blank now. “Nevermind,” he muttered.

“Michael, it’s not so simple,” Father said reluctantly. “It’s safest to keep you here while you’re sick.”

“I don’t care if I’m sick,” Adam mumbled.

“You don’t?” Father asked coolly. “But surely you care about what would happen to ‘Mom’ if you should revert to your true form while in her Heaven?”

Oh. Right. Because he was really a monster, disguised as a person. But it was nice to forget that, sometimes.

“Can’t – can’t you bring her to here, though?” Adam asked. “You’re God, aren’t you? Can’t you resurrect her?”

“No,” Father said. “I built this dimension specially to house you while you’re recovering. It’s not possible for a human to exist here.” Adam opened his mouth to speak, but Father cut him off. “Michael, this discussion is over. It’s not happening. End of story.”

Father vanished, and Adam stared miserably at the TV, feeling _considerably_ worse than before Father had tried to ‘comfort’ him.

Father visited him again that day, while he was lying in bed with a book. “Michael, I’m sorry,” he began, and that was shocking enough until he followed up with, “I was being unreasonable earlier.”

“Uh, you were?” Adam said incredulously. In all of his memories as Michael, he hadn’t once encountered such an admission from his Father.

“Yes, yes,” Father said impatiently. “You can’t visit your human mother tonight, but perhaps we can practice having you visiting a dimension on the same level as Heaven, so there aren’t any unpleasant surprises on the real trip.”

Adam’s eyes widened. “Really?”

Father ruffled his hair. “Yes, really. But it’ll take some time, okay? We need to make sure you can go there safely.”

“That’s fine,” Adam said eagerly. “When can we start?”

Father smiled.

**

Adam was very, very nervous as they approached Mom’s little slice of heaven. “I look human, right?” he kept asking Father. “I look like me?”

“Of course, puppy,” Father said soothingly. No matter what, Father was always in that same hermit man shape he had been wearing when Adam first found him. Adam remembered how his body had twisted and extended out of control during some of their practice sessions and clung onto Father a little tighter. Father didn’t seem to mind too much.

Mom’s heaven took shape as they entered it. It was, uh, a nightclub. With loud music, bright lights, and a ton of people grinding on each other. Adam, the lights. His throat closed up and his head started burning up. Father started pulling him away, but he couldn’t get his legs to move. Father then picked up him and carried him out of the Heaven with him over his shoulder.

When Adam realised the lights and the music was gone, he started to breathe again, shaking in his Father’s grasp. Father put him down gently and said, “I should have checked which memory your human mother was in before we entered. Are you all right, Michael?”

Adam swallowed and nodded, before realising in a panic that Father might be intending to take them back home. “I – I can handle it, Father. Please.”

“No, you can’t,” Father said, “But that’s fine. I’ll just shift her along to a less exuberant memory.”

He touched the Heaven, and it rippled for a few seconds before stilling.

“That should be better,” Father said. “Michael, are you ready?”

“Yeah,” he said, more confidently than he actually felt. They stepped back into the Heaven and Adam realised with relief that it was his childhood home in Windom. Mom was standing on one side of the living room, crouched with her arms outstretched, facing a blonde toddler on the other side of the room who looked like he was struggling to get up.

“Come on, sweetheart,” she coaxed gently. “You’re doing such a good job. My _big_ boy. He’s gonna get all the way to Mama, isn’t he?”

Adam relaxed, and watched with a slight grin as the baby stumbled to his feet and made it a couple of steps before falling down again. “Come on, you can do better than that,” he called out.

Mom sharply span around in shock. “Who –” She blinked a few times. “Wait, Adam?”

His toddler-self babbled happily when he heard Mom saying his name. Adult Adam opted to say, “Hey, Mom.” His head wasn’t feeling too hot, which was a good sign. He thought.

She ran up to him, holding his hands in hers. “You – you’re here!” She was smiling but that quickly faded. “You’re here – why – ” Her eyes were flicking from Adam’s face to his Father’s.

Oh. Right. You had to be dead to get into Heaven. And Mom wouldn’t know that Adam had been killed by the same ghouls that killed her. Or that Adam had been resurrected but he was now a half-archangel, half-human hybrid that could go anywhere. He wasn’t sure how much of that he could explain without upsetting Mom though. “Uh,” was his intelligent response.

“How long has it been?” she said. “On Earth.”

Adam could answer that at least. “It’s 2012.”

“2012? Adam, what are you doing here? You’re far too young,” Mom said. Well, maybe he should just tell her the truth so she couldn’t scold him anymore.

“I died when you did, Mom,” he said quietly, avoiding looking her in the eyes. “The ghouls got me too. I’m sorry.”

“No,” Mom said, taken aback. “No, that’s not allowed.”

Adam laughed a little. “Yeah, sorry. Um, it gets kinda weird after that.”

“ _After_ that?” She glanced at Father again, and suggested, “Maybe we should sit down.”

When they were sat on the couch, Adam continued, “Uh, so about a year after I died, some angels resurrected me. To be the vessel for the Archangel Michael while he fought the devil in the Apocalypse, they said. But they were just using me as bait for the real vessel.”

“Oh?” Mom said, her face fixed in a smile. “That’s uh. Angels?”

“Then it gets weird,” Adam said, and Mom laughed.

“Oh, we hadn’t gotten to the weird part yet? My mistake.” Adam flushed, and she squeezed his hand. “Sorry honey. Go on.”

“So, so, it – um, I guess I was the reincarnation of Michael the whole time, and these guys were messing around on someone else’s orders,” Adam recounted. “But they tried summoning him into the same room as me, and he did go back into me, so now I’m both.”

“Both?” she asked.

“Both people.”

“Hmm.” Mom didn’t seem too fazed. Adam wondered if it was a side-effect of being in Heaven for a while. She held her hand out and focused on it, and after a few minutes a scrapbook appeared inside it. She flicked through it and showed a page to Adam. “So that really is you, honey?”

He glanced at the page. Taped on it was a simple drawing of two circles on sticks, presumably people. One was taller and holding the hand of the other one, who had extra lines jutting out of where his shoulders might be. Underneath, in Mom’s handwriting, it said, “Michael and Mommy”.

“When you were four, you were convinced you were the archangel Michael,” Mom explained, smiling. “You kept telling me your wings were coming in any day now. But you stopped mentioning it by the time you’d entered kindergarten. I assumed it was just a phase.”

“Uhh,” Adam said, tracing it with his finger. “I don’t remember this.”

Father had come up behind them and was also peering at it. “It’s not uncommon for fallen angels to remember their angel selves a bit better before their human memory has developed.”

Mom turned to him with a steely gaze. “And who are you, exactly? Another angel?”

Father paused and then said, “Yes. I’m Michael’s older brother. I’m looking after him while –”

“What?” Adam interrupted, outraged. “Father, don’t lie to Mom.” He turned to Mom. “This is Michael’s Father. Better known as God.”

“God?” Mom said weakly. Father was glaring at Adam. He wilted a little.

“He – yeah. Well, please don’t worry about it too much, Mom. Everyone’s safe and happy now, right?” He patted her on the arm, but was then struck with worry. “You are happy here, right?”

“I – yes, of course, Adam, but,” Mom looked so lost. “This is a bit much. I don’t know…”

“Oh,” Adam whispered. That hurt a little. They stared at each other a while, before Father broke the silence by brightly saying,

“Well, now that everyone’s caught up, how about a board game?”

**

After that, it was hard. Adam felt terrible for scaring Mom like that. She hugged him and kissed him goodbye when they left her Heaven, but he still felt like he’d ruined their meeting by saying too much, too fast.

He spent his lonely days in the mansion as usual, wallowing in self-doubt. He would sometimes grab a knife from the kitchen and stare at it longingly, wondering if he could just cut his grace out and go back to being a normal kid who didn’t upset his Mom with all this angel bullshit.

Father’s visits started to up in frequency. Adam tried to be nice to him, but it was hard to make it sincere when he was so sulky and moody all the time. Father either didn’t notice or didn’t care about that though.

On his 22nd birthday, Father brought him a cake. Adam didn’t think he’d been awake for his last couple of birthdays, and wondered if Father would have brought him cake then, anyway.

“Thank you, Father,” he said politely.

“Happy Michaelmas!” Father said, while cutting the cake. Adam drooped at that considerably, and Father turned to him, looking a little horrified.

“Michael – no puppy, I’m just joking. This is for your birthday, okay?” He kissed Adam on the forehead.

“We’ll go see your Mom, as well. You know what that means, right?” He continued cutting, and handed Adam his slice. But Adam was aghast.

“No – no, we can’t see Mom, she won’t want to see me,” he protested. Father looked puzzled.

“Nonsense, Michael. She’s your mother, of course she wants to see you.” He pointed at himself and said, “I’m a parent too, so I know, okay?” His tone sounded light and amused, but his eyes were sharp. “More to the point, I’m your parent. So we’re going.”

Things went a little better that time. They had a party in Mom’s Heaven, and Father even fetched some other family members from their Heavens to come join in. Adam’s friends were luckily still alive and well, so it was a family-only event. Adam was just happy to spend time with real people.

When he got a moment, he pulled Mom aside to apologise. “Sorry for scaring you the other time. I wasn’t thinking,” he told her.

Mom was baffled. “Scaring me? What?”

“When I told you about being Michael. You were freaked out.”

“No I wasn’t,” Mom argued. She paused. “Well, I was a little surprised that the guy with you was God. I was expecting God to be, uh, bigger.”

Oh. “He makes himself look smaller than he is,” Adam explained. “Uh. Did that make sense?”

Mom gave him a wry smile. “Like you did, when you pretended to be my cute little baby Adam?”

Adam panicked. “I didn’t do it on purpose. Mom, I promise – I wasn’t trying to trick you or anything.”

She hushed him with a finger on his lips. “I know. You’re a good boy, aren’t you?”

Adam nodded desperately. “Then we don’t have anything to worry about, do we? Come on, we’re missing out on Jenga.”

**

After a couple of months, Adam worked up the courage to ask his Father.

“Father, can I live on Earth, please?”

Father was already saying “No” before Adam had finished the sentence, but Adam would not be deterred.

“I am in control of my grace. I have been practicing a lot to not be uncomfortable with it. And I wouldn’t use it in my daily life anyway.”

Father said, “Michael, you are still recovering. You have to stay here until you’re better.”

“Father, I can’t get better here,” Adam said, successfully confusing his Father. “I’m too lonely. I’m a person, you know. I need to be around people.”

“I’m here,” Father said, but Adam shook his head.

“You don’t live here, Father. You visit. I know you live on Earth.” Father scowled, and Adam tilted his head and said, “Can you honestly disagree?”

“No, but – Michael. Don’t you think Daddy knows best? You’re safe and happy here. Just a few more years, until you’ve got all your memories back, okay?”

“Father,” Adam said tensely, “Safe, yes. But I am miserable here. Are you trying to make me kill myself again? Because I certainly won’t last ‘a few more years’ here.”

A furious look emerged on Father’s face, and Adam was roughly flung into the wall behind him with a painful impact, and slid down onto the carpet. Father stalked over to him and scowled down. “Do not,” he said, “You will not. I won’t allow it. Michael,” his voice was shaking, “You must not. This is unacceptable, Michael. I have worked so hard to fix you and you threaten to break yourself again? No no no no no.”

Michael had never argued with his Father. His every instinct was screaming at Adam to shut up, kneel in front of Father and kiss his feet. But Adam couldn’t do that. He couldn’t live like that. He stared solidly at Father and remarked, “I am not making an unreasonable request. You won’t even allow me to trial living on Earth?”

“No,” Father spat, and suddenly Adam was in his bedroom, chained down to his bed. He groaned. This was going to take some work, huh?

But it was fine. He had all the time in the world, after all, as Father had kept saying. And when Father crept into the room that night and silently released the chains, placing a slice of cake on his bedside table, Adam didn’t say a word. He was a good boy, wasn’t he? Everyone kept telling him so. And Father was trying so hard to be a good Father, too. Adam could appreciate that, even if it was too late for Michael.


End file.
